


It's Alright

by cecilantro



Series: 100 Days Of Ficlets [31]
Category: Critical Role (Web Series)
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-03-29
Updated: 2018-03-29
Packaged: 2019-04-14 16:44:18
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,479
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14140215
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cecilantro/pseuds/cecilantro
Summary: You see the fault lines, started panickingIt's alright, It's alrightYou confide in the low light, you're so kind“You know, you don’t have to maintain the fake smile with me, Mollymauk. I see through your bullshit.”





	It's Alright

**Author's Note:**

> Have y'all heard [It's Alright by Fractures](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DNCH2-P0Lfs)? It's a very good song.

Molly’s bought himself a private room, he thinks Fjord may be a little hurt, but it’s not too bad. He can deal with Fjord being a little hurt, he decides, he needs the time and privacy.  
He doesn’t, actually. He _needs_ the company and comfort, he’s homesick like never before, not that he can reasonably remember. If he hadn’t been so fractured when he first joined the carnival, he probably would have been. But he’d been so broken then that he could barely speak, he remembers Toya sitting at his side, silent and calm, she had been so young, he had been so scared.  
He thinks of her and aches, it was like having a sibling, perhaps, he wouldn’t have anything to compare to.  
He misses the carnival. And Yasha has disappeared, more of her own business, given the crackle of the storm that masked her leaving, he’d assume that was the reason. At the beck and call of the Storm Lord, always, he’d pined for her the first few times she disappeared from his side at night, but not so much any more. When he turns over in the morning to empty space, now, the most it pulls from him is an ache, the least is a sigh. He still hurts and misses her, but it’s such a constant background noise to his life, he’s so used to pain, it’s a part of his every day.

He has a double bed to himself, he pushes it to one side of the room, by the window, opens up the space. He makes do when he must, with closed spaces, damp and dirty forests, dripping tents, but he has the option of luxury tonight. It takes a while, but he’s retired early, and with enough strain, he clears one side of the room.  
He stalks around, careful, sets up a full prayer ritual. Candles and all, incense, a brazier, and he lays his coat, folded, to rest his scimitars on. They cross, at the handles, he pats himself down.  
He’s forgotten his tinderbox. He looks at the candles and curses, a brief spark of hope in him wishes the Infernal might light the wicks, but it doesn’t.  
Detour then, he supposes, Caleb can light them up. On the positives side of the decision chart, he pencils in that Caleb enjoys solitude, too, and that’s enough to drive him to straighten from his crouch and make for the door.  
He locks it behind him. He takes no chances on Nott, or even on Fjord- if he worries, Molly is almost certain he’ll snoop. He doesn’t want anyone desecrating the prayer, not tonight, he needs it to be pristine.  
Each footfall is shrouded in shadows, the same kind that anchor and drag on Molly’s mind as he tries to think, the heavy cotton clothes weighed down by water, they cloak a drowning man scrambling for breath. And if clear thought is likened to air, the atmosphere is gone, there is only water, and the vacuum of space.  
He knocks, lightly, at Caleb’s door. It’s still early, entirely possible that Caleb is downstairs with their friends, drinking, having fun, learning to trust.  
The door opens, Caleb’s hands are unbound from their bandage protection against the arcane, they’re splattered with the telltale sign of calligraphy and spell copying. Ink. When Molly manages to meet Caleb’s eyes, too, there’s a smudge of it on his cheek.  
“Mollymauk?” Caleb asks him, Molly’s eyes whip over him, he’s not dressed to sleep just yet, Molly assumes he’s been completing the transcription of a spell.  
“Yes, sorry to disturb, I know you’re busy…” Molly is distracted by his own eyes wandering past Caleb, he has things he would trust only to the wizard’s earshot, not to Nott’s, he feels a little guilty for it but there’s limits to his trust at such a new bond.  
“Nott is not here, Mollymauk, if privacy is what you are wanting then you are free to come in.” Caleb stands aside, Molly sees the glimmer and burn as he waves a gesture with the hand not set to the door, Molly shakes his head.  
“I came to ask a favour, actually. I- oh, I’m an idiot.” He can just ask Caleb to borrow his tinderbox. What was he thinking?  
“Yes, I’m aware, what favour?” Caleb’s mouth tilts, almost a smile, not quite,  
“Can I borrow your tinderbox? Not sure where I left mine.” He grins, bright, wide, fake, Caleb frowns at him a little, so he continues with a string of honesty, “I thought I’d set myself up for a full ritual, since I have the room to myself tonight. But would you believe, all the candles in place, and I can’t light the damn things!”  
It’s showtune-style, the storyteller’s voice from the carnival, Caleb frowns in a new way,  
“I- I do not _keep_ a tinderbox, I have perfectly good hands, but I’d be willing to leave my work for a moment to light them for you, if you’ll allow me into your space.”  
Ah, Molly sort of hates that Caleb can pick up on that boundary so easy. He’s not sure how well he has it pegged, because even Molly isn’t sure if his issue is with others encroaching on something so personal to him, or the fact he doesn’t want anyone to see just how fucked he is right now. His ability to act like everything is okay is crumbling at his fingertips, he wants nobody to know that he isn’t strong. He can’t trust any of them to see his flaws, he must be smooth, no fault lines to chip at. Caleb is staring at him, he realises he hasn’t replied,  
“Sorry, yes.” He shocks himself at his acceptance, but rolls into it, “I’d appreciate your help.”  
Caleb nods and steps into the hall with him, takes a brief look at his key, and heads down the hall to Molly’s solitary room.  
“You know, you don’t have to maintain the fake smile with me, Mollymauk. I see through your bullshit.”  
Caleb isn’t looking at him, in fact, he’s walking away, Molly’s so shocked he stumbles as he follows. He gives no reply, can’t bring himself to lie, he’s already running on empty. Caleb stops at his door, and Molly’s hands shake as he makes to unlock it.  
Caleb sets a hand, gently, on his wrist. With the other, he takes Molly’s key, more nimble tonight than Molly is, he unlocks the door.  
His fingers stay, a burning presence on Molly’s wrist, he gives him back the key and lets Molly lead him into the room.  
“You’ll have to guide me.” Caleb says, and Molly looks over, he’s squinting, he’s struck with the realisation that Caleb can’t see anything.  
He twists the wrist under Caleb’s fingers and takes his hand, pulling,  
“You’d be better lighting a lamp, less chance of setting the wall on fire.” Caleb can hear the tired jest in his voice, and his fingers clench gently around Molly’s hand.  
“I will do what you ask.” There’s more, Molly feels, that he wants to say. He doesn’t. Just lets Molly pull him along as he retrieves a lamp, then to the window, where there’s the faintest hint of light from outside The Leaky Tap, Molly’s room faces the back alley, there’s only one lamp and it’s a distance from his window. It’s enough for Caleb to pick out Molly’s shadow, as he pulls his hand up, he feels Molly’s fingers slip from between his own and it’s cold in the moment before he touches the rim of the lamp, he breathes and gestures, very precisely, into the lamp, a few words in a crackle that Molly doesn’t understand, there’s a quick burst of light and the lamp is lit.  
Caleb’s first instinct is to look at Molly’s face.  
As Caleb suggested, Molly has dropped the fake smile, the impression of confidence, he sets the lamp down on the windowsill to rub the flash out of his eyes.  
He looks… tired. Not the regular kind, as a day of activity will leave you, but _tired_ , like Caleb knows, the kind that permeates to the bones and leaves the cold ache there that can never really be warmed away. Caleb reaches into his own pocket and withdraws the stub of a wax candle, it’s one that he uses to transport flames when he needs more precision than he’s able to give, and he makes to light it at the lamp. And then stops.  
“Mollymauk? I can light your candles, if you wish?” he picks his words carefully, his hands hover, Molly pulls his own from his eyes and looks to him.  
There’s a pause of silence. Caleb can’t see internal processes, and Molly is a little grateful, because his world has finally just cascaded in on him. He’s been holding it at bay for days, but he only has two hands, and very little strength, and with four walls, he just couldn’t do it. He _needs_ Caleb’s company, he doesn’t want to be alone, he doesn’t want Caleb to leave, he wants Caleb to hold his hand, stroke his hair, sit so close that Molly can feel the warmth of his skin. And only part of that falls under the bracket of dispersing Molly’s loneliness, the other part falls under the way that he sees him, now, in the lamplight. When the harsh yellow-orange lights at the line of Caleb’s hair in the way it falls, from Molly’s angle, across his face, like a dim red crack across his eye, gentle curve. Caleb’s eyes are _so_ blue, they could be glowing, the ink on his cheek is dry and smudged like it had been on the heel of his hand when he’d swiped it across his face. And when he looks to Caleb’s hands, shaking slightly with alcohol and general squishy wizard life, he sees he’s right- there’s a near identical angle of smudge on Caleb’s right hand, just under his thumb.  
Caleb puts the candle down beside the lamp and takes Molly’s arms, clamped gently to his side, as he begins to shake violently. He pulls him to the bed and pushes until he falls, unable to sit gracefully, he lands in a heap and sits up again, he’s not crying. He won’t cry, maybe he can’t, but he _needs_ and Caleb isn’t sure what. He sits close, not touching, just close, reaches out, but doesn’t touch.  
“Mollymauk?” He asks, desperation evident even in the soft tone, “Molly? Are you with me? Are you alright?”  
There’s a fade, in Molly’s memory, he hears the echo of himself in the mines. Does he, now, look the way that Caleb did then? He remembers the emptiness, how hollow Caleb had been, and when he looks now he sees his own masked fear reflected back at him from Caleb’s eyes. Does he look hollow, too?  
Molly’s hands inch out to him, and Caleb slips to take them, a comforting weight,  
“Would you-” Molly chokes on his own words, on his own _need_ for such a favour as this, “Would you stay? Here? Don’t- please, leave, don’t-” He doesn’t cry, but he chokes on what the tears could be, Caleb nods and shushes him.  
“Of course. Do you want to continue your prayer?”  
“I- I have to, every night-”  
“I can help, if you are okay with that.” Caleb offers. Molly feels his thumbs stroke, symmetrical patterns on the backs of his hands. He swallows, once, and nods.  
“I am going to let go of you, for now.” Caleb warns, “I will light your candles and your brazier. Is there anything else you would need from me?”  
“No, that’s all.” Molly shudders, and when Caleb lets go of his hands, he brushes himself down. Caleb gives him a curious glance, and Molly’s head shakes, “I can’t disrespect my scimitars with my problems.” and a quick, genuine flash of a grin, “I have you for that.”  
Caleb pauses, halfway through a step to the lamp, and leans over to kiss Molly’s forehead.  
“ _Ja_ .” he agrees, and continues his work, lighting the candle stump and going from each candle to the next, when Molly doesn’t reply, he tacks on, “I- I know that we have been companions only a few weeks, Mollymauk, and I do not trust you yet, but- hm.” He pauses, thinks, continues, “I think,” careful, “That you are someone very special. And I care for you. And if you need me, you know, always, where I am.”  
“Well, tonight, that’s my bed.” A hint of the old Molly as he makes his way around to take a seat, cross-legged, in front of his scimitars. Caleb lights the last candle and moves to sit at the edge of the bed.

It’s respect, not self-imposed rules, that keep Molly from inviting him down. His feelings for Caleb at that moment cloud his dedication to the scimitars, he holds him at that time at arm’s length, Caleb understands, Molly knows he does.  
Caleb, in fact, enjoys this more than participating ever could. Fjord’s preferences are on Molly’s fight, the weapon, the strength he draws. Caleb’s are on _Molly_ , himself, he’s set to record as he observes each and every movement, flicker, notes every word that he understands from Molly’s mouth and fights the charm of pain in those that are Infernal.  
When Molly finishes, the first thing he does is apologise.  
“I know, I- I should have thought, Infernal does _things_ to people who don’t speak it-”  
Caleb cuts him off with a very, very brief kiss. He just about catches Molly’s bottom lip, it’s not the physical that stops Molly’s words, but the shock. And Caleb continues as though that hadn’t stopped Molly’s heart dead in his chest, he watches Caleb wander around him, lick at the pads of his thumb and forefinger, and pinch out each candle in turn.  
“You’re still staying tonight?” Molly asks, he doesn’t make an effort to disguise the twinge of nervousness in his voice. Caleb smiles, nods,  
“I will have to go to Nott, briefly, or she will panic, but yes.” he stands, having snuffed out the last candle, and finds Molly’s tail wrapping around one of his wrists.  
“Do I- Would- Should I say it?”  
He doesn’t say what _it_ is, he hopes, very dearly, that Caleb already knows. He seems to, because Molly’s question draws the ghost of a laugh from him, his free hand strokes over Molly’s tail, gentle. He unwinds.  
“When I come back, perhaps. Something nice to open the door to.” And Molly watches as Caleb smiles, gives his tail one last pat, and leaves.  
As the door closes, he says it anyway,  
“Caleb, I love you.”  
And when he returns, the first thing that Caleb says, is  
“I love you, too.”

**Author's Note:**

> I'm aware this is the second "comfort Molly" fic in two days im having mental issues apparently?  
> psychoanalysis tells me im telling myself what _i_ need to feel better by going "hey what if molly" uhhh  
>  im gonna prepare myself a heckload of caffeine, what is coherent thought?


End file.
